(superl.) Evil in great degree; dreadful; dismal; horrible; terrible; lamentable.
Example Sentences:
(1) Why is it so surprising to people that a boy like Chol, just out of conflict, has thought through the needs of his country in such a detailed way?” While Beah’s zeal is laudable, the situation in South Sudan is dire .
(2) It is that beautiful moment when the original Metamorphosis is destroyed so that it can be refashioned for a global community of readers in dire need of new forms of storytelling.
(3) In this investigation, reanalysis of responses to case vignettes obtained from 436 psychologists, psychiatrists, and internists revealed that on the issue of confidentiality management, these health care providers discriminate among cases involving: Premeditated harm to others, socially irresponsible acts with possible dire consequences to self or others, and minor theft.
(4) The report’s concluding chapters raised dire warning that the operations of contemporary child protection agencies were replicating many of the destructive dynamics of the Stolen Generations era.
(5) Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, warned Barack Obama in public remarks this month that history had shown “sacrificing our right to privacy can have dire consequences”.
(6) Algeria had not scored a World Cup goal since they drew 1-1 with Northern Ireland at Mexico 1986, a run that took in five matches, including that dire 0-0 draw with England in Cape Town four years ago.
(7) Professor Lord Stern of the London School of Economics, the author of the influential Stern Report into the economics of climate change for the Treasury in 2006, warned that if the pattern continued, the results would be dire.
(8) High among the range of issues was the media dominance of the Globo group (whose journalists were chased away from demonstrations by an irate mob), inefficient use of public funds, forced relocations linked to Olympic real estate developments, the treatment of indigenous groups, dire inequality and excessive use of force by police in favela communities.
(9) Burrows had resigned as governor of Bank of Ireland, leaving the lender in dire straits, with big losses and mounting debt threatening its very survival.
(10) Yet the inability to get on in life is a now a major and growing problem for middle-class children and this group is in dire need of attention, it is expected to report.
(11) Vince Cable, their shadow chancellor, said: "The Liberal Democrats welcome the government's recognition that radical action is now needed, reflecting the dire and deteriorating position of the UK economy.
(12) Its willingness to ignore diplomatic convention and use its Kuala Lumpur embassy to conduct an extraterritorial assassination will be seen as setting a dire precedent that cannot be allowed to stand.
(13) What is clear, however, is that the reported escalation in fighting exacerbates the already dire humanitarian and human rights situation and the suffering of the Yemeni people,” said Ban’s spokesman, Farhan Haq.
(14) In a scene of young soldiers at rest for a few minutes at the front, he takes us into their heads: one full of dire forebodings, another singing, one trying to identify a bird on a tree – soldiers dreaming of girls’ breasts, dogs, sausages and poetry.
(15) Despite its own dire predictions on the potential impact of climate change , the government's impact assessment for Flood Re does not take account of " changing flood risk due to deterioration of existing flood defences [or] climate change".
(16) The situation is so dire the National Audit Office has warned that by 2020 schools will be worse funded than at any time since the mid-90s.
(17) John Macgregor, an aid worker who has been accompanying teams delivering food and water to Battambang, described the area as a vast inland sea where conditions are dire and malnutrition is common.
(18) But they are also the stuff of nightmares, because if an electricity grid is overwhelmed by demand, the consequences can be dire, as India discovered recently , when more than 700 million people were left without power.
(19) Thousands of jobs that would have been created will be lost and the knock-on effect will be so dire.
(20) While big businesses have enjoyed access to new couriers, Royal Mail itself eventually reached such a dire state that the Hooper report urged the government to rewrite the law to clarify that competition was a mixed blessing.
Sombre
Definition:
(v. t.) To make somber, or dark; to make shady.
(a.) Dull; dusky; somewhat dark; gloomy; as, a somber forest; a somber house.
(1) Photograph: KHIZR KHAN This sombre, serene oasis overlooking the Potomac river might also prove the graveyard of Donald Trump’s ambitions for the US presidency.
(2) Seethetree Kingley Vale, Sussex Forget the colours of autumn; this place is sombre in colour and atmosphere but you will be walking among probably the oldest living organisms in Britain.
(3) Slowing growth, financial fragility, governments teetering on the brink of insolvency and default, and clear signs of a public backlash against the excesses of the rich and powerful: all have created a sombre backdrop to the invitation-only affair.
(4) King gave a sombre assessment of the government's challenge at a press conference to launch the Bank's quarterly inflation report.
(5) Top floor: a roomful of sombre youths vying for individual supremacy using some form of networked arcade strategy game that uses collectible cards.
(6) In sombre tones he did indeed acknowledge that there are no sunny uplands as we "now face a crisis that is the economic equivalent of war" .
(7) In March 1990, in a ceremony in the new Congress building built by Pinochet in his home town of Valparaiso - 80 miles from the capital, Santiago, and intended to remain well out of mind of the real centres of power - a sombre Pinochet handed the presidential sash over to Aylwin.
(8) Q has upped his gadget game Facebook Twitter Pinterest The brooding and sombre Skyfall scored a few points for post-modern playfulness via its introductory scene for the new Q, in which Ben Whishaw might as well have offered Bond a couple of Netflix vouchers and a year’s subscription to Cosmopolitan for all the wow factor his proffered “gadgets” achieved.
(9) Another report, Sir Derek Wanless's Securing Good Health for the Whole Population (2004), set out the sombre consequences of our slobby habits: life expectancy cut by nine years, increased coronary heart disease and diabetes, and a cost of £8.2bn to the economy.
(10) She’s very serious in her style, very well-informed in her style, it won’t be the same as David Cameron,” he said, welcoming the idea of a more sombre tone.
(11) In a sombre closing speech, Clegg warned of "a long hard road ahead", and said the economy was "our biggest concern" because "the recovery is fragile".
(12) A grand and sombre staircase - dark, looming, pitiless - leads up from the Axes to the exhibits, allowing Libeskind to play one last trick on the visitor by luring him up a final flight that goes nowhere, before his voice gives way to the memoranda of Jewish history.
(13) It is now recognized that as much as left ventricular dysfunction these ventricular arrhythmias are of sombre prognosis.
(14) South Africans have undergone sombre introspection of late with the economy slowing, unemployment sky highand, worst of all, violent unrest that included the killing of workers at the Lonmin platinum mine in August.
(15) Helen Hunt and John Hawkes are deservedly recognised for their fine performances in The Sessions, while Kathryn Bigelow 's sombre, gripping Zero Dark Thirty bags a quartet of nominations, burnishing its credentials as the dark horse of this year's Oscar race.
(16) There were reports this morning that Gaga was reluctant to perform after the death of Alexander McQueen last week and had told organisers she would only play a set that was suitably sombre (with images of McQueen projected as a backdrop apparently).
(17) In a sombre letter to his youngest child, Mohamed wrote: "Sorry because you were born where free people are behind bars, including your father."
(18) Although they may draw images of sombre and disciplined technicians in white coats, labs in the modern industrial context are a nebulous idea.
(19) Although relatively rare, stenosis must be diagnosed in view of its sombre spontaneous prognosis (one patient died 3 days after coronary arteriography), of the risk of underestimating its frequency, and of the hazards of selective coronary catheterization in such patients (one of our patients died 15 minutes after coronary exploration).
(20) In a sombre ceremony, the eight men were remembered and honoured by name as families and relatives paid their last respects.